Gibbs: We Still Love the Young, Struggling Joey Logano

Let's face it, the kid many in the NASCAR garage have referred to as sliced bread -- here's an explanation of the reference -- hasn't exactly been a great beacon of Sprint Cup championship hope for Joe Gibbs Racing in his first three races.

In other words, 18-year-old Joey Logano is really a real person, and, no, he's not going to single-handedly Kyle Busch-ize the 2009 NASCAR season (and probably doesn't want to after we've seen what happens to Busch when the pressure is on).

Logano, who made his first NASCAR start at Dover in June's Nationwide Series race, won his first race rather quickly at Kentucky Speedway. Then, Tony Stewart left Joe Gibbs Racing effective the end of 2008 and opened a seat for the 2000-version of Boy Wonder to take the reigns of a championship NASCAR team before he's even old enough to sip the champagne.

It left me with a negative feeling about the kid who has seemed to have been served NASCAR as a whole on a silver platter, but those feelings were soon washed away when his Sprint Cup debut didn't trivialize the entire sport. In three races, he's had an average finish of 37th and word says he was slower than NASCAR's minimum speed at Texas last week, though he was allowed to continue.

As always in NASCAR, the bad finishes have allowed the rumor-mongers to creep in, saying Logano might be replaced in 2009 by Dale Earnhardt Inc.'s Martin Truex Jr.

Well, such a rumor summoned J.D. Gibbs, president of JGR and son of team owner Joe Gibbs, to the track in Phoenix on Saturday to offer up the truth on the Logano situation. So, J.D., is Joey a no-go for the No. 20 in 2008?

Joe Gibbs Racing president J.D. Gibbs reiterated on Saturday that Joey Logano will drive the No. 20 Toyota in 2009.

"Everything he's done up to now he's done exceptionally well," Gibbs said. "When you get to this level, everybody is really good. [...]

"We threatened him within an inch of his life - just finish the race," Gibbs joked. "It's just going to take time."

That whole "threaten" joke might not have really been so after readers during our live blog at Texas talked about a high amount of whining across the Logano radio for the way his Toyota was handling. Needless to say, it was a long day for Wonder Bread.

Welcome to NASCAR, Mr. Logano.